CUSTER COUNTY, Colorado — The man accused of fatally shooting three people and wounding a fourth person near the town of Westcliffe in Custer County Monday afternoon is now in custody, the sheriff's office said.
Hanme Clark, 45, was arrested by New Mexico State Police on Interstate 40 about 35 miles west of Albuquerque Tuesday afternoon, law enforcement said. Custer County Sheriff Rich Smith said he was stopped in the truck that deputies had been looking for.
A woman was with him, and investigators are working to figure out what her involvement was, Smith said. New Mexico state police said she was taken into custody.
Clark was wanted on a warrant for three counts of first-degree murder related to Monday's shooting, which happened just before 1 p.m. at 173 Rocky Ridge Road. The sheriff said the shooting took place in the woods near a gravel road and that it took responding deputies 22 minutes to get there due to the rural location.
Once there, they discovered four victims who had been shot. Two men and a woman were killed. The surviving victim, a woman, was taken by ambulance to an area hospital and flown to a Colorado Springs hospital for additional treatment. As of Tuesday afternoon, she is recovering in the hospital.
Smith became emotional several times, wiping away tears while giving an update to the media earlier Tuesday.
"I'm grieved that our community has experienced gun violence resulting in the loss of our citizens," he said.
The sheriff's office said Clark had been in an ongoing dispute with another property owner over a gravel road that traversed his property.
"It's an easement that the neighbors use to cross his property," Smith said. "So there's kind of an informal gravel road and that's a source of irritation for him."
The Custer County Coroner's Office and the sheriff identified the deceased victims as Rob Geers, 63, Beth Wade, 73, and James Daulton, 58. All of them were involved in the property dispute, Smith said.
Rob Geers and Beth Wade were husband and wife, the sheriff said. The woman who was injured, Patty Daulton, is James Daulton's wife. She called 911 and told them that four people had been shot and that she believed her husband was dead. Additional gunshots were heard during that 911 call, according to an arrest affidavit from the Custer County Sheriff's Office.
> Watch the full media briefing from Tuesday afternoon:
A fifth person, who was surveying the property at the time of the shooting, told investigators that he ran about a half mile to the neighboring property to call 911, according to the affidavit. He was not hurt and was able to provide investigators with a good description of Clark. He also told them he was working with Geers to survey when they were approached by a man who was yelling about trespassing, the affidavit says.
He said Geers called the man "Hanme" and said he believed Geers was recording the interaction prior to the shooting, according to the document.
On Friday, Geers filed a trespassing complaint with the Custer County Sheriff's Office and showed them a video of a man in hunting gear holding a rifle, the affidavit says. The video had been taken from a game camera on his property. Geers, according to the affidavit, was certain the man in the video was Clark, even though the man was wearing a mask. He said it was the fourth time Clark had trespassed on their property.
Following the shooting, investigators used drones and did a foot search before they gave an all-clear around 8 p.m. Monday. As they did that search, Smith said, they obtained "digital evidence" that Clark's truck had been spotted in Chaffee County.
Using FLOCK surveillance cameras, officers discovered that Clark's truck entered a Walmart parking lot just after 3 p.m. and a a woman got out of the truck, went inside, and purchased pillows and winter clothing items, the affidavit says. Smith said that investigators were "confident" that Clark was also at the location.
He said they now believe Clark had left the shooting scene in his truck before deputies arrived, but investigators still conducted a ground search to be certain. He said the crime scene was guarded overnight and that investigators returned to the scene Tuesday morning to process it in the daylight.
Law enforcement in Chaffee County sent out an emergency alert Monday night, notifying people in Salida and Buena Vista about the search for Clark.
A helicopter from the Denver Police Department arrived earlier to assist in a search for Clark. After searching for several hours, it was determined that Clark was no longer in the area and the shelter-in-place was lifted.
Property dispute
According to a lawsuit over the easement dispute filed in December 2020, the property associated with Clark was donated to Herbal Gardens Wellness by the previous property owner in 2019. Smith said that Clark was in the "ownership structure" of the business.
In June 2022, a judge sided with the other property owners, which meant they were legally allowed to use the gravel road to cross Clark's property. Those property owners were not involved in the shooting Monday. One of those property owners, Hartwig Kinzli, told 9NEWS Clark didn't like that a judge ordered him not to block their access to the easement.
"There's a legal process called an easement," Smith said. "Some of the neighbors have a legal easement to drive through the suspect's property. That's recorded with planning and zoning. They've been through court numerous times with lawyers and things, and as of today the easement stands."
However, in late October, Kinzli and his wife filed a motion to hold Clark in contempt of court and detailed how Clark was refusing to allow access.
"So the suspect has complained about the neighbors, and the neighbors have complained about the suspect," Smith said.
He said the agency had been to the property numerous times in the past.
"Absolutely no indication it would lead to this," he said.
Kinzli told 9NEWS that after the motion in October, Clark began driving through the property of Rob Geers and Beth Wade, two of the victims in the shooting. Kinzli said that's why the couple hired a surveyor to come out Monday.
The Daultons live south of Clark. A friend said the couple was heading to Greeley to spend time with their daughter for Thanksgiving when they stopped by Geers and Wade's property, knowing the surveyor would be there. That's when Clark confronted the four neighbors, the affidavit says.
SUGGESTED VIDEOS: Investigations & Crime